


How Much Worse Can It Get?

by brightandshinynewstories



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Angst, Dissociation, Episode 69
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-07
Updated: 2019-07-07
Packaged: 2020-06-24 08:00:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,471
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19719514
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/brightandshinynewstories/pseuds/brightandshinynewstories
Summary: Molly won't leave Yasha behind.





	How Much Worse Can It Get?

**Author's Note:**

> I originally posted this on Tumblr and people seemed to like(?) it, so I figured I'd put it up here, too.

Molly doesn’t see Yasha attack Nott, but he hears the scuffle and shout, and looks over to see her looming over the goblin with her sword raised. It says something about the situation that his first thought is an irritated _again?_ as he sprints towards her. It’s almost an afterthought, slashing his sword across the back of her shoulder. He remembers the well, how she came to after Beau hit her a few times, and when he completes the strike and turns, he’s heartened to see her smile.

“I think–” he starts, and then forgets whatever bright comment he was going to make as Yasha takes a single step forward and puts her sword through his chest.

Things get a bit strange after that. There’s a lot of screaming, and he definitely feels it when the sword rips its way out of his chest (oh, _that's_ familiar), but then he must have blacked out for a moment because the next thing he’s aware of is being picked up off the floor and hauled away at a near sprint. Whoever’s doing it drops him hard on the floor, but a warm wash of healing magic soothes it away. 

He wouldn’t mind just lying there for a few minutes, actually. Let someone else try to un-Charm Yasha. The poor thing might respond to Beau punching her again, if it comes down to it–

“–Still inside!” Nott yells, and Molly forces himself to sit up. Caduceus is leaning over him, healing magic fading from around his hands and the oily sheen of Fear moving under the surface of his eyes. He allows Molly to grab his arm to steady himself getting up, though, so it can’t be too bad. 

They’re in the hall outside the chamber, but he can still hear noise coming from inside, that awful, chattering laughter that rings in his ears like Infernal. Beau is right up against the door, staff at the ready, jaw set, eyes hard. Molly almost gets the chance to ask what’s going on when the door opens on a nightmare. 

Fjord, staggering, about to fall. The Laughing Hand, its many fleshy mouths gaping, filling the foul air with laughter. Yasha, grinning like Molly had only rarely seen her do, sword ready at her side, looking up as the door opens. 

(Later, much later, when _most_ of them are out and relatively safe, Molly will get horrendously drunk to keep himself from thinking about what happened next. He doesn’t want to remember Yasha slashing at Jester and catching her double by sheer chance. He hates that the last smile he saw from her was that twisted, mocking thing. The details fade a bit, smearing together, and Molly is so, so glad.)

Beau drags Fjord to safety, and the door starts to shut again. Jester and Nott reach for Yasha standing on the other side and scream out for her, but it’s Molly who lunges for the dagger that will unlock the door. He’s so close, claws just scraping the hilt, when someone grabs him by the back of the coat with a strangled cry of “Don’t!”

Molly twists and snarls. That’s _Yasha_ in there, they _saw_ her, and she’s in there with that thing…. More hands join the first, grabbing at his arms and coat, pulling him away. Someone is shouting in his ear, so he flicks his head to the side, trying to catch them with his horn and maybe get free enough to get to the gods-damned door, but whoever it is jerks away at the last second. Molly can feel himself screaming. He twists his fingers and manages to hook a claw into the skin of his palm, feels the welcome burn of blood magic ready in his veins, and–

Beau strikes him three times up his spine. He knows it’s Beau because suddenly the simple act of standing has become much, much more difficult. The magic sullenly fades away as Molly struggles to move, to scream– _What’s the matter with you?! She’s still in there!_ He feels the hands holding him back move to hold him up instead. The others are talking, but all he can hear is the blood pounding in his ears and his own breath, labored and heavy under the effect of Beau’s efficient strikes. 

It’s Beau who ends up carrying him as they race out of the tunnel. He hears it when they reach the bridge, the whispers growing loud as they flee. They’re partway across when he finally gets the feeling back in his limbs, just in time to catch himself as Beau pitches forward. Fjord turns to catch her and meets Molly’s eyes. They’re close to the middle of the bridge now, but still closer to the chamber, to Yasha. Molly desperately wants to turn back, but the others are pressing at his back, and even through his own panic and anger he knows that this is not the place to stop.

The trip across the bridge passes like a fever dream. Beau comes to, wincing and staggering. Caleb lets out a cry and strikes himself across the face. Jester and Nott and Caduceus shout warnings and instructions, heedless now of the whispers as the opposite side draws near.

Molly pushes free, gives the others just enough time to clear the last of the clanking metal planks, and darts for the bridge. He feels someone grab at the back of his coat again, but this time he slips his arms out of the sleeves and leaves it behind. _She’s okay, she’ll be okay, just hold on Yasha…_

“Molly! She’s not coming out!” Fjord shouts, but it’s Beau who leaps from the cliff’s edge to the chain railing and steps down in front of him. The clanking sets the whispers going again, but neither she nor Molly react. 

“She made her choice, Moll, remember?” Beau says at last. She sounds flat, not angry or resigned or upset. “She wanted to track Obann down. She wanted to come here.”

“She doesn’t deserve to be trapped down here,” Molly snaps back. The others are making noises to the effect of _we need to leave!_ , but he stays focused on Beau. “Didn’t you see her? Did that look like her to you? Believe me, it wasn’t.”

Beau stares through him as she replies, “We can’t do anything right now, because some of us already almost died fighting that thing, and if you think any of us are going to let you run back there…she’ll just kill you, Molly.”

She’s making sense. Molly doesn’t want sense. He wants Yasha, here, and safe, and not trapped with some horror and the corpse of the monster who drew her here. He wants Beau to just get out of his way, because the idea of leaving Yasha down here is a cliff he can’t see the bottom of. The old emptiness is back, yawning on every side, and the only thing cutting through it is the metal bridge, and the tunnel, and the dagger-opened door. He feels like he could tear apart a dozen more demons with his bare hands. He feels like he could shatter from a touch.

That might be why he doesn’t even notice the not-real brush of magic until it’s too late. Hold Person closes on him like a gentler version of Beau’s nerve strikes, and suddenly it doesn’t matter what he wants because his friends are hauling him up again and carrying him away.

He barely notices the rest of the flight from the tomb. He knows, dimly, that he should still feel angry, and scared, and perhaps a dozen other things, but his head is full of that awful, gaping nothingness. The entrance looms in front of them, bright against the darkness of the interior, and then they’re through. It isn’t until he’s released and left to stand on his own that he realizes the Hold Person had worn off. He should feel something about that.

Fjord asks if they should have known. He means “Should we have trusted her?” 

Caduceus looks around wildly, the Fear in his eyes replaced by fear, before steadying himself with talk of the Wildmother and the Kiln. “No one is stupid,” he says.

Jester defends Yasha in her firm, sweet way. “We spoke to her in her quietest moments,” she says.

Molly should defend her, too. He knows this. The others go on fretting, panicking, calming, reasoning, and he stays there, standing with his tail limp in the dust and his coat draped across his shoulders. He thinks Beau might have put it there, but he’s having trouble deciding why he thinks that.

The others are moving, and Jester and Beau and Caduceus are drawing him along with them.

Every step takes him further from Yasha.

He should feel something about that.


End file.
